


It's Not A Fashion Statement

by HoloXam



Series: Newt is Tired, a character study [3]
Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Depression, Drabble Collection, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Pining if you squint, Self-Destruction, Self-Harm, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, no happy endings we suffer like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-21
Updated: 2019-12-06
Packaged: 2020-07-08 21:54:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19876684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HoloXam/pseuds/HoloXam
Summary: Newt-centric ficlets about depression and other ghosts.CW for self harm, suicidal ideation and self destructionof different variety throughout!!





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hong Kong, 2019  
>  _(Originally posted on tumblr)_

Newt left the lab in such a hurry he didn't even remember to bring his jacket, and he sorta regrets that now, standing out on the landing deck in the pouring rain. It’s windy as hell, raindrops coming in closer to horizontally than vertically, and great big waves are crashing against the edge of the platform, sending sprays of salty ocean water into the mix.

He’s soaked to the bone and shivering, jeans clinging to his thighs, white dress shirt sticking to the skin on his arms and chest. His glasses are covered by a sheet of water.

Not that there's anything to see out here, apart from the dark threatening clouds and the raging sea.

 _Pacific_ Ocean? Newt’s bare ass.

He ought go back inside, get out of the god damn _rain,_ but he can't. He can't because he is so angry he might punch someone, something, get himself in trouble.

(Newt's 29 years old and was relocated from LA to the Hong Kong K-science branch four months ago. He packed his guitar and his leather jacket and shipped out any important samples, and has been playing extreme home makeover on his new quarters. It's cozy, it's punk, it's almost home. Now he might have to flee to the end of the Earth.)

It's not entirely Newt's own fault, it can't be. He's got better things to do than read every single email and newsletter and whatever else that goes into his mailbox. Someone could have fucking _told_ him. Couldn't they?

Yeah. They could.

_“Hey, Newt, we’re relocating another bunch of K-scientists to Hong Kong, is there anyone you absolutely can't be within a mile’s radius of?”_

Would that have been so hard?

He’d almost been over it, okay.

He breathes out slowly, closes his eyes, and leans into the wind. Fucking Hermann Gottlieb. Newt jams his hands into the pools that are the pockets of his jeans. He's not crying, it's just the _rain_. And if he is, it's an unfortunate side-effect of the chemical reaction from the white-hot rage encountering the slime-green shame in his stomach.

He wants to throw up.

Maybe he’ll go inside, and get blackout drunk in his bunk.

Maybe he’ll just jump into the ocean.

Newt screams into the rain.


	2. Control 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW for self-harm & suicidal thoughts in this one.

There is death in his brain. 

Not brain death, but a taint, a _low,_ a spot of rot that sends its tendrils through all of the gray matter contained in his skull. 

Limbs heavy, eyes fixed on the ceiling, Newt is crucified on his bed. Movement an impossible option, nowhere to go, since everywhere is even worse.

The room is silent, but his heartbeat, unsteady in his ears, drowns out the sound of his own breath and the round-the-clock hum of the jaeger bay not so far away. 

He doesn't hurt. 

There are two weeks’ worth of laundry on the floor, but the ceiling is clear and wide, so he stares at it in search of a calm that fails to come. 

Nothing. Nothing at all. That's the only thing he craves. 

_This might be an emergency,_ he thinks. _Albeit a very slow one._

A manic little asshole, he's been called not so long ago, and, God, if _only._

Does he prefer floating atop a sea of energy, mind going a million miles an hour? 

Maybe. 

Maybe not. 

It's difficult enough having to continue _being,_ without adding favourite _states_ of being to the equation. 

He would like to scream. He would like to stomp on porcelain cups with heavy boots. He would like it, if someone magically appeared with a tub of ice cream and a Nine Inch Nails record. 

Newt lifts his arm, aiming to gain momentum enough to crawl out of bed and take a walk around the room, but— _nope._ It falls back down on the bed, limp and heavy.

He closes his eyes. 

_Blood,_ he thinks. 

He knows that there's a scalpel in his bedside drawer.

He runs a calloused fingertip along the inside of his lower arm. The tattoos were expensive. They also keep a secret.

There's a scalpel in his bedside drawer.

Before he got them, Newt would sometimes come into work in the morning with a massive bandaid on his lower arm, afraid yet eager to be asked what had happened. 

He'd roll up his sleeves in defiance, ready to say, _I scratched myself on a sharp corner._ No one ever asked. 

There's a scalpel, there's a scalpel, there's a—

No. 

There's no reason. It doesn't even work. There's no gratification, no relief, nothing won. Except for the sweetness of the secret, of something he cannot and will not share. A physical mark of the mental condition. 

Addictive. Is it worse than drinking? 

He wants to do it. Wants to do it so bad. The ultimate control—he can't foresee the next attack, he can't control the incomprehensible samples on his work table, he has long ago accepted the fact that he cannot even make other people _like_ him—but he can control what happens to his own skin. He can decide to break it. He can break his own skin and know that he did that, know that he rationally decided to do that. 

Nothing happened, and he was in perfect control. 

_You're_ not _rational right now, pal,_ Newt says to himself, fingertips tracing the outline of his main artery over and over and over again.

His phone dings. Newt grabs it. Looks at the notification. It's his app for tracking mood swings, recommended by everyone and their therapist, useless in practice, because when Newt's good, he's _great,_ and when he's not, it's pretty damn obvious.

_Do you have a moment to reflect on your thoughts and feelings?_

Absolutely.

_Are you looking hopefully into the future?_

Newt snorts. There's a _war_ on. That's gonna be a solid _nope._

_Do you currently find your daily tasks to be exhausting?_

_Yeah, pretty much._

_Do you have people you can rely on?_

Newt sucks his lip in between his teeth. He does have that. Does he? Doesn't he? 

Everyone always _leaves._ His mom. His almost-girlfriends. His almost-boyfriends. Interns, colleagues, research-partners. Jaeger pilots he had drinks with. They leave, or they die, or they stay behind in Boston. The only one who sort of sticks around is Hermann, and Newt and Hermann can't stand each other. 

Officially. 

_Well._

If nothing else, Newt can rely on Hermann to profoundly dislike him. He clicks _yes_ and puts the phone down on his stomach. 

_Hermann._

Maybe things are salvageable with Hermann.

Maybe Newt should reach out to Hermann, before he fucking kills himself. 

(No, Newt's not gonna kill himself, it's just a _phrase_ that's been churning, churning, churning in his thoughts, while his workload has increased and his energy has plummeted to zero. That's probably normal. Totally normal. Nothing to see here.)

He closes his eyes and runs his fingers over the skin on his wrist, simultaneously imagining Hermann's fingers and a steel blade, allowing himself neither. 

Hermann, covered in chalk and pale as death herself.

Hermann, all edges and angles. 

Hermann, mind and tongue like razorblades.

"Oh, _that's_ why," Newt groans, and turns to bury his face in the pillow. 

Newt always does this. His life is nothing but a circular path of solitary self-destruction and trying to smother the sharply edged people he attaches himself to in the hopes they'll either save or annihilate him. 

Yeah, Newt's the actual worst. He doesn't deserve this. He'll show them. He'll make a big fat scar on his thigh, and that'll... show them. Or whatever.

If only he could _sleep._

He reaches out and opens the drawer. Trails the edges of the wood. 

Then he slams the drawer shut and pulls at his own hair instead, screeching into the pillow cover, kicking his knees against the mattress. 

Then he collapses against the sheets, out of breath, embarrassed and exhausted. 

He should probably call someone. 

"Screw it," Newt whispers, digging around for his phone. He presses buttons fast, before he can conjure up second thoughts, and rests the phone against his cheek. 

Hermann picks up after the second ring, and Newt's stomach drops.

"Yes, Newton?" Hermann says, exasperation loud and clear even through the shitty connection.

“Hermann?” he tries, and Hermann says, _“What?”_

"Are you awake?"

"Yes, it's nine o'clock in the evening," Hermann says. And then, softer, "Is something the matter?"

“No, nothing,” Newt says and hangs up.

Nothing at all. 


	3. (the repetition kills you)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> continued self harm warning!

When it comes down to it, it's a defense mechanism.

When the breach collapses in on itself, Newt's entire relevance collapses with it. 

And that's okay, that's _good,_ for everyone but Newt. 

The end of the world was treating him better than most; Newt made sense. The world made sense. You had the good guys, the monsters, the fake ass wall of life fascists, and an urgency that meant an unhealthy caffeine habit and no sleep schedule was necessary for survival.

Newt was fit for the Apocalypse, but. 

But this after? 

Not his scene. He needs urgency. 

He wants the high, the thrill, the adrenaline, and if he can't get it naturally, he'll do whatever else it takes. 

Without thinking hard about it, he runs a sterilised scalpel through his palm, wincing at the pain. He stares at the blood for a while, then wraps his hand up in paper towels.

That's gonna be hard to explain. 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> PRU!Newt just havin' a good old time with himself! Rated M for masturbation and uh, D for drinking

He doesn't mind being an occasional drunk, somehow that's almost human, a left-over quality that is somehow so Newt, and in any case, he likes the way the buzz calms him down.

Three shots of scotch and his brain stops vibrating, three more and he's unsteady on his feet but not exactly blackout drunk. And you can drink them over ice in a glass so that it _looks_ classy. 

From his place on the couch, Newt has the immense view of the city; without glasses it should be mostly a blur of lights, and when he's seven shots in, it is. 

He thinks of Alice. Thinks of Hermann. Everything is quiet enough tonight, and he longs for a cigarette and a firm hand, longs for a break from everything.

He rubs himself through the front of his pants, not yet too drunk to get it up, and thinks about being fucked into submission, thinks about dying, thinks about the drift, and about his own wrists. When he licks his own lips it's sensual, and Newt shivers and moans, bucking his hips against the pressure from his palm. 

His other hand feels like a stranger's as it roams over his chest, up into his hair, across the back of his skull, settling around his neck. When he squeezes, it's almost enough. 


End file.
